The art of securing valuable devices such as computers or business machines to a surface such as the top of a desk or a table is a subject of extensive development. Generally it is recognized that no mounting can be completely secure. Almost any practical mounting can be overcome by brute strength or by the use of appropriate tools. Therefore, instead of attempting to provide an impregnable arrangement, the effort is or should be made to require such expenditure of time that the thief would run an unacceptable risk of capture to remove the article without damaging it, or of excessively damaging the article if he takes the article quickly enough.
Speaking generally, a five minute delay will discourage a thief, because this approaches the response time of police in many areas. Damaged goods cannot be fenced. So the theft becomes too risky or pointless if it takes too long or yields unsaleable goods. Therefore any device which can frustrate removal without damage for even a few minutes is advantageous, and may serve as well as a device which could absolutely hold the article. Such a "lesser" device can be made much less expensively.
Commercially successful devices have been made and sold in accordance with Gassaway U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,850,392 and 3,910,079. The scheme of these devices is to attach the equipment being secured to a rigid upper plate. A pad adhesively adheres to the surface, and a rigid lower plate or plates is or are secured to the pad. The upper and lower plates can releasably be locked together. The lower plate is often provided with a skirt which restricts access to the foam pad, and means is customarily provided to exclude a garrot wire from beneath the pad. For example, see Gassaway U.S. Pat. No. 4,065,083.
This construction provides an attractive alternative to systems which require drilling of holes in the furniture and using tie-down bolts or screws to hold the equipment to it. It offers the opportunity later to substitute the equipment and to change its location without leaving behind a structurally modified or defaced piece of furniture.
However successful the prior art devices have been they still require expensive parts which can be justified only for relatively expensive equipment. When the cost of equipment to be protected falls, as is the situation today with personal computers, a less expensive security device is needed because the cost of protecting an article ought not to approach the cost of the article itself. While seeking this objective, some of the shortcomings of the earlier devices can also usefully be addressed. This invention accomplishes all of these objectives.
One disadvantage of the earlier devices is that if the equipment is to be moved, the foam pad must be removed from the surface by the application of heat so it will come loose. This is a messy and time-consuming practice which often leaves a dirty surface behind. While messy, it still is an improvement over security mountings where the table or desk must be drilled or otherwise pierced.
Another surprising disadvantage of known mounting systems resides in their stiffness. One is inclined to assume that a very rigid device would be more difficult to remove from a surface, such as with the use of a pry bar, than a more flexible device. This is not rigorously true. Although it is tricky to accomplish, it is possible to "pop" a rigid system off of a surface by prying it up at its edge. Actually, and surprisingly, some flexibility is advantageous in the instant invention because, as will later be seen, if the edge is pried up, the plates are likely to be bent, and the protected article is likely to be destroyed before the mounting comes loose from the surface. Furthermore, even if not seriously damaged, the mounting is apt to remain attached to the equipment, because the mounting will be distorted in such a way as to prevent its removal. Because a thief has no reason to damage an article he wishes to steal, or to carry off the security mounting also, this feature alone contributes substantially to the security of the installation. If vandalism rather than theft were the object, a hammer would serve quite well for his purpose. But the thief's objective is to remove an undamaged and functional article, and this invention frustrates it. Interestingly enough this attractive feature is obtained with the use of less expensive, easier-produced parts.
Yet another disadvantage of many earlier devices is that the table or desk surface must be permanently dedicated to the equipment--even when the equipment is temporarily removed. This is because the lower plate includes projections that make it unsuitable for anything to be placed on it while the equipment is removed.
The device of this invention can readily be removed from the surface after its security feature is released, can be made much less expensively, is more flexible in certain parts in order to discourage attempts to pry it loose and causes an even stronger retention after an attempt has been made to bend it.
Yet another advantage of the invention is that it enables a plurality of devices to be secured with only one lock.